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Thursday, December 19, 2013

New Plan For 'Dyas Triangle' Purchase

Fairhope, Alabama
fairhopetimes@att.net

CONSERVATION FUND DROPPED OUT

At tonight's council meeting, Mayor Kant announced that he was recommending The Conservation Fund (click) not be included in the pending purchase arrangement for the Dyas property (as was proposed at the last council meeting) -- opting instead to finance the remaining $5.7 million via a local bank loan ($3 million has already been committed from city funds).

Kant said difficulties arose during the negotiations with attorneys for the three parties involved over various stipulations in the agreement.

Kant: "After a lot of negotiations ... we had difficulties getting everybody on the same page."

The only other option would be to have the Dyas' self-finance the purchase at 4% interest vs. the 1.35% being offered by Compass bank (5 year term). (The Conservation Fund would also have charged 4% interest.)

(Note: The usual council meeting scheduled for Monday was moved forward because of the holidays)

GOVERNOR CHIMES IN

The mayor said the issue came up during a meeting with Governor Bentley last Monday; and he (Bentley) was enthused about the project -- and urged the city to acquire the property with a loan first, in anticipation of applying for state/federal grants to eventually re-imburse the city.

A loan would make obtaining the grants easier, according to the Governor.

A total of about $12 million is needed to completely fund the Fly Creek Watershed Restoration Project, hopefully with BP fine money (Restore Act) whenever it becomes available.

Even if the BP money doesn't materialized (a 50/50 chance has been mentioned), other grants may be available via state Fish and Wildlife, Forever Wild, and ADECA (trails) programs.

COUNCIL PRESIDENT CONCURS

Councilman Burrell, who also attended the meeting with the Governor, said the Conservation Fund's stipulations could not be met -- and the new plan "makes the most sense."

Burrell: "He (Bentley) was very, very enthused about the project ... don't know exactly how long it may take to secure the funds ... (but) feel very confident we will recover the cost of this ... ."

Burrell highlighted the savings of the $350K in fees the Fund would have charged -- on top of savings from the lower interest rate.

Compass bank will charge only $2,500 in fees.

SPECIAL MEETING CALLED

The city council has called a special meeting for Dec 27th at 10AM to vote on the new proposal.

The entire purchase agreement must be finalized by the end of the year, according to the lawsuit settlement agreement reached earlier this year with the Dyas family.

Kant said in the interim, "people will have time to tell us what they think ... ."

10 comments:

It looks like TCF's overhead was considered too high. It's great that the City is shopping around for the best financing, but they will probably find that TCF is pretty reasonable for this amount of money. As a bonus, their fee is applied only for as long as it's needed (quarterly) so it encourages the parties to act quickly. In the end, I'm confident our City will get the best financing deal they can and will complete the acquisition. This is a great project.

Because great towns have open space for their residents and visitors to enjoy. And Fairhope has run out of 100+ acre parcels that border tidal creeks. This is our last chance to grab a vanishing commodity. Residents' wallets will appreciate the rising land values and increased tourism dollars, while I'll enjoy recreating on the park's trails for free.

Oh wise one has pulled another one over us residents. The Council President is a clone of the Mayor. When we buy this 100 acres it is more property taken off the tax rolls and on the back of the tax payers. Kant must have gone to school with Obama and Nancy from California. The truth is Kant promised the Dyas family he would get their project approved and it did not happen. Now the taxpayers will pay. Oh well I can ride by and see our new flower clock and ride down the hill and see the USS Kant. Thanks, Kant, Fiddler, SLigh and those that plan to take all of our money.....

You three people that respond to every issue with the same old, tired and silly refrain, need to take your negative and hateful and remarks and go find some place to live that won't make you miserable every day. The rest of us love Fairhope and are very grateful to those who make it so loveable. This council was elected, overwhelmingly, on a promise to work with our mayor. He was reelected, overwhelmingly, because of what he has done for our city. I retired here because this is where I want to be. And it has to do with many of those things you three miserable writers love to repeatedly complain about, flowers, parks, facilities, activities and very reliable utilities.

You three very unhappy people that write the same tired, hateful and silly remarks, no matter what the issue, need to find a place to live that won't make you miserable every day. The rest of us love Fairhope and are very grateful to those that make it so loveable. This council was overwhelmingly elected on a promise to work with our mayor. He was reelected, overwhelmingly, because of what he has done for our city. I retired here because of many of those things you choose to repeatedly complain about, flowers, parks, activities and recreation. A lot of us read this blog to laugh at your outrageous remarks, but they are getting too old to be funny anymore.